I wasn't really trying to stir up a conversation by using the term "African American". Really I could have said black people but said African Americans for no real reason in particular.

feliciano182 wrote:

Hey, i have two George Lopez DVD's at home, and i laugh at whatever the guy is taking pot shots at, certainly joking about ethnicity or stereotypes can't be counted as racist commentary.

Actually, I'm glad you brought up George Lopez. I remember seeing him on tv doing a Just For Laughs concert. Just For Laughs is a yearly comedy festival in Montreal. The audiences that attend these shows are typically white. And so he seemed to tailor his routine. And I think most comedians do that when the audience they are performing to is predominately white. It's a way of relating to them. If I saw a black comedian talking about the differences between white and black people I don't think I'd find it offensive. If the audience is mostly white, it would almost be an ice breaker.

feliciano182 wrote:

I will have to agree with Sun on this one, that is a lame excuse that BLACK people keep exploiting today,

I think my original point was directed more at white people who complain about some double standard. Being white I don't know what it's like to be black or Hispanic or whatever, but I do know that black people for example have been put through quite a lot of shit over the years. So much so that when someone like Dave Chappelle makes a joke about "white people food" I don't get too butt hurt over it. Really my issue is when you have white people (usually male, usually in their thirties) who are indignant that they can't use the "n word" or say "why can't I be proud because of my white heritage?". It seems disingenuous.

_________________

"Heard them Walthers like to jump some" "As will you, with one in your elbow."

I have to admit, "shoot them" was me being a tad facetious. In this case, "shoot them" was a metaphor for "would not be very well received." I don't think any ethnic group is more prone than another to inflict violence on anyone. It's all on that particular person.

Quote:

To compare this to "white power" is ridiculous.

Not really. "White pride" would have the same connotation to the average person, IMHO. There would be no difference between "power" and "pride" in the minds of those people. Either/or would be considered a racist statement, while any other group would be tolerated, well received and socially acceptable.

Quote:

Mexicans and African Americans are two groups that have gone through a lot of persecution over the past couple hundred years. When you take that into consideration I think they could be forgiven for making the odd "cracker" joke every now and then.

That is a crutch. When was the last time you heard a jewish person using their peoples' former subjugation and horrible treatment as an excuse to get away with something that another set of people can't? The jews went through Auschwitz. Yes, black folks were made slaves, and mexican folks had their land stolen from them. These are important footnotes in history, and something that everyone should be aware of, but that doesn't make these past events a reason to get away with something that another group cannot get away with.

Quote:

Have you ever heard of french-canadians being deported ?

I have not, yet I have heard of white people being deported back to their native land because they were not legal citizens. It is a legal issue, not a racial issue. I don't know the statistics on how many people illegally immigrate here every year, but for whatever reason, we seem to notice the Mexicans more than anyone else. Now THAT in and of itself may be a racial issue, but their deportation isn't.

Quote:

Most of the world IS bilingual.

This is true, but you're ignoring the subtext: English is a SECOND language for many countries. If I tried to get a job in France (or where ever), and I could not speak THEIR language, they would not consider me for a position the way we do for folks here that do not speak English, regardless of whether or not the majority of their population could potentially be bilingual. Get a job in Mexico, they want you to be able to communicate with their clientele in the tongue that 99.9% of people there speak, regardless of what other languages they may or may not know. Same with France, Germany, etc. Let's say I got hired; when someone comes up to the counter to ask me a question, and I can't understand them, nor can they understand me, there's a problem. No, if I couldn't speak the local language, they would easily hire someone who could over me just for that reason. It's logical, it makes sense.

_________________Who Washes The Washmen's Infinite Secrets of Legendary Crossover Knight Wars?"If you immediately know the candlelight is fire, the meal was cooked a long time ago."

I am sorry, but you ARE NOT a minority. Therefore you have not seen and experienced the racism that we have. Much of the immigration crap IS racist. You may not think so, but you have never been treated like we have.

And there is a HUGE difference from us saying "brown pride" etc. to you saying "white pride."

To most people IMHO, it would be taken as utter racism, while the other stuff would not (at least not to the majority).

On this subject I want to express that as much as I do admire the "black power" movement, any kind of race pride is utterly ridiculous to me. It's like saying Blonde pride, or Rich pride. It makes no sense.

Mexican pride, Irish pride, Navajo pride, etc. makes much more sense to me. It has nothing to do with race, but heritage, patriotism, culture etc.

Again I want to stress that even though some whites do acknowledge that there is sever racism in the US (which I extremely appreciate), they will NEVER truly understand what we minorities feel and experience in terms of racism.

also with the language issue - most places in Europe actually kind of don't like you if you can't at least speak some of their native language, i know because my friend's brother went to italy (study abroad program in college) and he said that he saw american tourists being harassed because they could not speak italian.

It's not too much of a language issue, it's more of a "we don't like American's issue."

I went to Paris last year and know very little French. So I decided instead of sounding like an American tourist, I'd try to speak to them either in Spanish or accented English (along with the French that I knew), and that seemed to work out. When I told them that I was from Mexico they seemed pleasantly surprised.

TBH, Mexicans seem to love speaking English. If you visit they like to be helpful and show off their English more than they would in France for example.

Joined: Sat May 30, 2009 11:08 amPosts: 252Location: The Gemini sector, tooling around the space lanes of the frontier.

Whoa, whoa, WHOA. The post I am about to quote is eighteen different kinds of wrong. Allow me!

diego1235467 wrote:

I am sorry, but you ARE NOT a minority. Therefore you have not seen and experienced the racism that we have.

I have to be in a minority group to experience racism the same way a person in a "real" minority group does? No, I'm sorry. I have been treated negatively because I am white more times than I can count. As I said before, I get called "white boy" all the time at work, I have had black people not include me in basketball games because I was white. I could go on and on and on, but my point here is that you can be of ANY race and experience racism the same way that anyone else from any other race does.

diego1235467 wrote:

Much of the immigration crap IS racist.

I understand that this issue hits very close to home for you, but this is a knee jerk reaction. I said in my above post that the fact that Americans seem to notice the immigration of Mexicans more than any one other group of people may be racist IN AND OF ITSELF, but not wanting someone to come to your country illegally is not a racist issue. Again, I don't care if you come here legally. That one of the principals this country is founded upon. I only have a problem if you come here ILLEGALLY, whether you're brown, white, black, purple or green.

diego1235467 wrote:

but you have never been treated like we have.

Again, this is a knee jerk reaction. How do you know I have never been treated in ways that Mexican/Black/anyone else people have? You don't know that, you're making a generalization here, painting in broad strokes, I might add.

diego1235467 wrote:

And there is a HUGE difference from us saying "brown pride" etc. to you saying "white pride."

No, in my mind, there is not. "White Power" is, of course, associated with the Aryan Brotherhood and Hitler. These are bogeymen, the same bogeymen that any group of "pride" people can have. Fanatics exist in all shapes, sizes, and colors, my friend. If one group of people can celebrate their heritage and be proud of it, while it is all socially acceptable, why can another not?

diego1235467 wrote:

Mexican pride, Irish pride, Navajo pride, etc. makes much more sense to me. It has nothing to do with race, but heritage, patriotism, culture etc.

So white folks can't be patriotic without it being racist simultaneously?

diego1235467 wrote:

they will NEVER truly understand what we minorities feel and experience in terms of racism.

Knee jerk reaction. You may find this hard to swallow, but I have had more than my fair share of hateful treatment because of my race. It is irrelevant how much racist treatment someone receives. It is not a contest. Racism is racism, and just because it's your opinion that your group has received more bad treatment than another (note that I did not say minority group) does not make it any different.

_________________Who Washes The Washmen's Infinite Secrets of Legendary Crossover Knight Wars?"If you immediately know the candlelight is fire, the meal was cooked a long time ago."

I understand that this issue hits very close to home for you, but this is a knee jerk reaction. I said in my above post that the fact that Americans seem to notice the immigration of Mexicans more than any one other group of people may be racist IN AND OF ITSELF, but not wanting someone to come to your country illegally is not a racist issue. Again, I don't care if you come here legally. That one of the principals this country is founded upon. I only have a problem if you come here ILLEGALLY, whether you're brown, white, black, purple or green.

So you don't think that inmigrants risk their lives by trying to cross the border ? simply because they want what's best for their families ? if what Diego said is true, about people having to wait 20 years to get a green card, then how can you look down on people who came into the country illegaly ? they didn't went through so much shit simply because they were too lazy to fill the papers, it's because they didn't want to wait for some bureaucratic asshole to stamp his approval for their requests while they were dealing issues in their native homeland, specially if the bureaucratic asshole is taking several years to do it.

Your own country, which you apparently love so much, was built from the ground by ILLEGAL inmigrants, or did you think that the irish, jews and italians had to wait for their green cards in the 1920's ?

And I don't care what you say, but the prejudices that you have faced are much different from mine. We don't get pushed out of basketball games. We don't just get called racist names. We get attacked, shot, killed, arrested, etc. because were minorities.

Have you faced prejudices? I'm sure you have. But not like us. Don't act like white americans are treated as badly as other races here.

And you missed my point on the "pride" thing. I was saying that I DO find it ridiculous to say "white pride, brown pride, black pride, etc."

But I have no problem when a white American has "Irish pride, Jewish pride, Italian pride, etc," because these things have NOTHING to do with race. Me having Mexican pride is much different than having "brown pride"

And let me point out that I am extremely light skinned. I have faced the prejudices other whites face, as well as prejudices that hispanics face. There IS a big difference.

And what do you expect from people who have tried EVERY possibility to enter the US LEGALLY and end up being turned away for bullshit reasons? They try and are left with NO OTHER OPTION than to risk their lives by coming here illegally. You shouldn't be angry at them, you should be angry at the US for having such fucked up immigration laws.

I think the problem, Sun-chained-in-ink, is that every human who's ever lived has been a hypocrite to some degree.

As for the legal/illegal debate, I personally think that feliciano is in the right. Illegal immigration is really just a symptom of a greater problem. At the same time, I'll agree with Sun in saying that it's a really bad symptom. Unfortunately, it won't be easy to figure out what to do with undocumented immigrants until fewer of them are coming in, and ethnic minorities -- including illegal immigrants -- will need pacification before things calm down enough for us to start securing the border. Which should we deal with first, the chicken or the egg?

_________________This is truly a madhouse. And I'm the lunatic running it. I've spent three years wondering if I should be proud or ashamed.

Joined: Sat May 30, 2009 11:08 amPosts: 252Location: The Gemini sector, tooling around the space lanes of the frontier.

What I'd like to see happen is for them to give any illegal immigrant (regardless of race) a year or so to become a legal citizen, and if they didn't, then they would be deported. Of course, that's wishful thinking on my part, I have NO idea how they would implement such a system.

I completely understand fleeing to the United States when the country you live in has gone to shit. I am human, and I can grant leeway in this case. However, why can't these people fix their illegal status once they emigrate for their home country? Why are they still illegal after having lived here for several years?

Diego, I like you. Let's get that out of the way, first and foremost. I think you're cool. However, racism is racism. It's not a contest. You've been treated hatefully, and so have I. The degree to which you have been treated with hate does not make you "the winner" if you opine that you have been treated that way more so than I. There are examples I did not include in my last post for the sake of being polite that are far worse than simply being told that I can't play basketball with someone else.

My friend's car broke down once, and we were forced to walk through an area of San Diego called "Barrio Logan" to get to the trolley stop so we could take the trolley somewhere where we could get something done about his car. Less than 15 minutes into that walk, we were (quite literally) fighting for our lives, as a bunch of Mexican fellows decided that the two chubby white boys didn't need to be in "their 'hood." It started with them following us shouting racial epithets, and escalated to pushing, shoving, and eventually Josh got punched in the face. It went screaming downhill from there; it was us versus like, 12 Mexicans, all because we were white and walking through the "wrong 'hood." What saved our asses was someone else driving by who called the police, who happened to be close, and THEY came to our rescue. I don't want to say I was happy. Delirious is more like it. I literally thought were were going to be beaten within an inch of our lives and robbed blind.

To conclude, as much as I like you, don't tell me what kind of racism I have and have not experienced. You don't know what I've been through. To give this a Watchmen hue, you could say the same about anyone on Earth.

_________________Who Washes The Washmen's Infinite Secrets of Legendary Crossover Knight Wars?"If you immediately know the candlelight is fire, the meal was cooked a long time ago."

And just as I don't know what you've been through, you don't know what we've been through. It's a two way street on that one

And they probably weren't Mexicans, but Chicanos or something. Just pointing that out. Again, I get pissed when people call others Mexicans when they're not, AND when they call themselves Mexican when it's not true.

Anyway, the illegals who manage to make it here DO try to become legalized, but it's the same shit. I know a woman who has been here since she was 4 or 5 (she's now in her 40's), and she is STILL trying to get her papers.

Like I said, it's not a lack of trying, it's a lack of possibility. In my eyes the entire immigration system here is broken. The biggest problem is that the laws are completely shady, and kept from the general public. No one really know how it works. That's why you guys keep on with the "why are they not coming here legally," and we keep trying to do just that, unsuccessfully. It's all completely fucked up. It's safe to say almost the entire US population is oblivious to how this works (me included).

P.S. This debate will get heated, I will be getting pissed off and it will be a tense atmosphere, but I hold no personal grudges against anyone here. You guys are all badass

i still have to heavily side with diego, not for any personal reasons, but because i know some of the stuff that he talks about happens quite a lot here on long island, new york. for a better understanding/reasoning, please view the documentary Farmingville. that's just a taste of what happens here in LI.

a little side note: pay no attention to any critic response or anything like that. just watch the documentary. still working on finding a link for it. i would post the rotten tomatoes link, but that would be a horrible thing, as after reading people's comments and wondering why it was given a score of 76, it made me sick.

All of these discussions end with "white people can't talk because white people haven't experienced racism." If you don't completely agree with the minority view being presented, you're racist and not allowed to participate in the "debate."

_________________I don't mind being the smartest man in the world. I just wish it wasn't this one.

All of these discussions end with "white people can't talk because white people haven't experienced racism." If you don't completely agree with the minority view being presented, you're racist and not allowed to participate in the "debate."

i don't agree. i've been harassed because of being white before. there have been plenty of race-related deaths in which the victim is white. so no.

edit: ah, thank you 4chan for finally posting something good to use. this cartoon brings up some great points about racism.

And no, doomshadow, that's not how these discussions end. The point is we ALL need to listen and understand each other. White's need to hear us and understand the shit we go through, and we need to listen to the whites. Racism benefits no one.

The reason why this topic is more one sided, is because my point was to explain the racism that Mexicans face. That's why I have hardly mentioned Blacks, Asians, etc. I'm trying to discuss the racism my people face, not racism in general.

But as you can plainly see, whites have a lot of room to talk. Curi doesn't agree with everything I say, yet he brings up good points (for example). As long as it contributes productively to the conversation you go right ahead.

All of these discussions end with "white people can't talk because white people haven't experienced racism." If you don't completely agree with the minority view being presented, you're racist and not allowed to participate in the "debate."

i don't agree. i've been harassed because of being white before. there have been plenty of race-related deaths in which the victim is white. so no.

edit: ah, thank you 4chan for finally posting something good to use. this cartoon brings up some great points about racism.

I'm sorry, but I believe the reason that, socially speaking, we don't like the term "white pride" its because all the killings and all that stuff. For example, there wasn't any black man or group (AFAIK) that killed so many people like the nazis (I know, Goodwin's law, but it counts).

Here's something to consider: Mexico. We've been talking a fair bit about how the U.S. government has been dragging its feet on the immigration issue, but it sounds to me like fixing these problems will require participation from both countries. So, what has the Mexican government been doing to help improve emigration to the U.S.?

_________________This is truly a madhouse. And I'm the lunatic running it. I've spent three years wondering if I should be proud or ashamed.

Here's something to consider: Mexico. We've been talking a fair bit about how the U.S. government has been dragging its feet on the immigration issue, but it sounds to me like fixing these problems will require participation from both countries. So, what has the Mexican government been doing to help improve emigration to the U.S.?

Should they really be doing anything on that matter ? would they want to ? no one in the government would facilitate it for their citizens to leave their own country, because that's not "the point" in their eyes, what they can do at best is to keep a more closed watch on coyotes and people trying to cross the border, maybe that could reduce the number of inmigrants entering the US, or simply, in far more broader terms, provide their citizens with a better quality of life and letting them get what they try to find in the US, so that they don't have any reason to emigrate in the first place.